


Period

by AuthorAlex97 (Sweetie_Curfy)



Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Gen, Growing Up, Periods, Teen!Remus, Trans!Virgil, adoption au, kid!virgil, teen!Roman
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-10
Updated: 2020-07-10
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:55:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,315
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25189054
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sweetie_Curfy/pseuds/AuthorAlex97
Summary: Swallowing his panic, he tried his hardest to take a deep breath. He grabbed a wad of toilet paper and wiped, hoping to scurry to his room and get rid of the evidence of any injury before anyone could find out, but it came back soaked in just as much deep, dark blood as before. Tears sprung to his eyes as he let his hyperventilating take over.“Daaaaaad!”
Relationships: Anxiety | Virgil Sanders & Morality | Patton Sanders, Logic | Logan Sanders/Morality | Patton Sanders
Comments: 10
Kudos: 147





	Period

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings: Blood, periods, crying, explanation of the menstrual cycle, brief mention of sex, implied/referenced past child abuse, brief mention of past character death, Remus Antics (brief, non-graphic mention of a gory scene in an old movie)
> 
> So, this has been a fic I’ve wanted to write for 12+ years, a fic that’s transpired fandom after fandom after fandom: an explanation of what a period is, to help others who won’t get/understand an explanation from other sources. I know this gets a little info-dump-y, but I tried to make it understandable. This fic is for you kids who are nervous about getting yours for the first time, like I was, and I hope seeing characters you love going through it, too, can help!
> 
> This is also the first fic I’m posting, I guess, of this Adoption AU I’ve had in my head for a while! I’ve got a couple other ideas in mind, including a part 2 to this focusing more on Roman and Virgil, sooo hit me up for some AU questions, if you have any!

It was true that Virgil hadn’t really been feeling well in the past week.

He didn’t know what it was, but everything just felt… off. He didn’t want to socialize with anyone; being around people had been making a fire of rage burn in his chest, and the fact that he didn’t know _why_ just made it ten times worse. He was exhausted to the point of nearly falling asleep in class, and would have slept through his alarms _twice_ and been late if it hadn’t have been for Roman waking him up when he didn’t come for breakfast.

Speaking of, he hadn’t had much of an appetite, and he’d hardly been eating because of it. Even the _idea_ of eating anything had made him feel a little gross. And his stomach had been cramping a _lot._

Realistically, Virgil knew this was something he should tell Patton or Logan, but he just couldn’t bring himself to do it. It didn’t matter how many times Roman reassured him that their dads wouldn’t be angry at him for getting sick; until he saw it for himself, he wasn’t going to be able to believe him. So what if Patton was a nurse? So what if Roman and Logan had butted heads dozens of times since Virgil had moved in, and it had never dissolved into a screaming match? That didn’t mean they wouldn’t turn on _him_ , or that _he_ was a good enough kid to avoid getting on their bad side!

Besides, he wasn’t throwing up or running a fever! He was just going to waste their time if he said anything. They had more important things to worry about than him. It’s not like he was _dying_ or anything.

…Or, so he’d thought, until Thursday afternoon when he went to the bathroom and found his underwear _covered_ in blood.

Virgil almost screamed at the sight. As soon as he recovered, he frantically searched his body for any sign of a scrape or scratch that could have left such a mess. There was nothing. Maybe… Maybe it had already healed?

Swallowing his panic, he tried his hardest to take a deep breath. He grabbed a wad of toilet paper and wiped, hoping to scurry to his room and get rid of the evidence of any injury before anyone could find out, but it came back soaked in just as much deep, dark blood as before. Tears sprung to his eyes as he let his hyperventilating take over.

“ _Daaaaaad!_ ”

Footsteps came rushing to the door faster than he’d ever heard in this household. “Virgil, are you okay?”

He choked back a sob. “I-I’m bleeding…!”

“Okay, it’s going to be okay, kiddo,” Patton soothed. “Can I come in?”

Virgil looked at himself, still on the toilet, and set the wad of toilet paper on the tank. He scrambled to stand and pull his pants up before whimpering out an “Uh-huh”.

Patton calmly came in and shut the door behind him. “Alright, where are you bleeding?”

“I-I don’t know!”

“You don’t know?” he asked with a frown.

“I…” Virgil picked up the toilet paper and showed it to him, lowering his voice to a whisper despite no one else being in there with them. “It was all over my underwear,” he explained. “And when I wiped, I…”

He trailed off as Patton tilted his head to inspect the blood, and then understanding faded onto his face as he looked away in thought. While it was only a few seconds, it felt like an eternity; his stomach started to cramp again, and Virgil found himself trembling.

“I-I haven’t been feeling good this week,” he admitted. “My stomach’s been hurting, and—and all I want to do is sleep, and I didn’t say anything because I didn’t want to bother you guys, and I’m sorry, I should’ve said something, I don’t want to die, I don’t want to be sick, I don’t want to have to go to the hospital, please—!”

Patton shushed him and ran his fingers through Virgil’s hair. “Hey, hey, relax, it’s alright! You’re okay, Virgil. You’re not going to die, trust me. Especially not on my watch.”

He leaned over, put the toilet lid down, and gently pushed Virgil to sit on it before kneeling in front of him. He took a few seconds to chew on his lip in thought.

“Virgil,” he started, “At your old school, did your teachers ever take an afternoon to talk to you guys about puberty?”

Virgil shook his head.

Patton let out a breath and nodded. “I guess they probably think it’s a little too early to talk about it, huh?” he muttered. “Am I allowed to touch your stomach, honey?”

Virgil hesitated, but he nodded after a moment. Patton reached up and placed his hands on Virgil’s lower belly. When he flinched, he used his thumb to rub gentle circles into it.

“Okay, so, in your body, right down here, you have this thing called a uterus,” he softly explained. “When people are pregnant, that’s where the babies grow before—”

“Am I _PREGNANT?!”_

“No, no, no—!” Patton had to hold back a laugh, taking his hands away to cover his face for just a second before returning them to their original position. “You’re not pregnant, Virgil, don’t—don’t worry about that!”

Virgil snapped his mouth shut, lower lip still trembling. Patton offered him a reassuring smile as he continued.

“Your uterus has these two things connected to it called ovaries.” He used his two index fingers to draw out where they would be. “They hold a bunch of tiny little eggs inside of them that eventually would turn into people—but _only_ under certain circumstances, at certain times, usually involving another person. If you were to get pregnant, you’d know, understand? It’s not going to happen randomly.”

Patton didn’t move on until Virgil nodded.

“Okay. Now, about once a month, one of these two little guys is going to let one of their eggs go,” he said, “and it sticks to the wall of your uterus. And your body goes…”

Patton threw his hands into the air and waved them around. “’ _Yay! We’re gonna have a baby!’”_ he cheered in a cartoony voice. Virgil let out a weak snicker. Patton counted it as a win.

“It starts to get ready for this potential baby by building up this lining around the walls, so that it’ll be extra protected from harm. And for a little while, if you… Ah…” Patton’s face turned red. “Do… certain things, with certain people, that egg might get fertilized, and that’s how pregnancy starts.”

“Like… kissing?”

Patton hummed. “No, you’d have to do a little more than that. More, uh… adult stuff.”

Virgil nodded, looking at the floor very seriously. “Taxes.”

It was a fight to keep his laugh in. “R-Right. Taxes.” He cleared his throat and continued. “Um, anyway, if that egg doesn’t get fertilized, your body says, ‘ _Oh, darn! Well, maybe next time!’_ , and it gets rid of the egg, and then it gets rid of that lining so it can make a fresh one for the next egg.” He pointed to the bloody toilet paper still gripped tightly in Virgil’s hands. “That’s what that blood is. It’s not a cut, and it’s certainly not an omen of death. It’s just a sign that you’re growing up.”

Virgil stared at the toilet paper for a long moment. “…Am I going to have to do this every month?”

“Well, not at first,” Patton replied, putting his hands on his knees. “This is a brand new feature in your body right now, so it’ll take a bit for it to fall into a real cycle. For a little bit, you might have a couple within a month, or you might not have it for another three after this. But, eventually, yeah, the body will balance itself out.”

“How long is that gonna take?”

“It depends on your body. If it takes a while, or it doesn’t seem like it’s going to balance at all, we can look into some options to help, like birth control or hormone therapy. Modern medicine is a great thing,” he said with a wink. “How about we save that conversation for a little later, though? See how this pans out for now?”

There was a beat, and then Virgil slowly nodded. He shifted and tipped his head away. “What do I do about my underwear?” he whispered.

Patton hummed and sat back, looking up at the ceiling. “Well… I’ll be honest, kiddo, I can talk your ear off about anatomy and the medical side of things, but I don’t have a clue about the products and stuff. How would you feel if I called Remus’s mom and asked her to come explain that stuff to us?”

Virgil wiped at his eyes. “Okay.”

Offering a gentle smile, Patton held his arms open; there was a moment of hesitation, and then Virgil leaned forward and wrapped his smaller arms around him. Patton held him tight and rubbed his back.

“Thank you,” he whimpered.

“Of course, sweetie. That’s what your Pop and I are here for,” he reassured. “And don’t you ever worry about bothering us if you’re not feeling well, okay? We care about you more than whatever silly things we might be working on. We _want_ to take care of you, okay?”

Virgil shuddered in a manner that was suspiciously similar to that of a repressed sob; when he spoke next, his voice was tight and high-pitched. “Okay.”

They sat like this for a moment, with Patton holding his son close, rubbing a hand over his lower back, until he pressed a kiss into his hair and pulled back.

“Alright, Virge, I need to go call Mrs. Drake,” he said. “Is your stomach still hurting? Or anything else, for that matter? I can get you some medicine to help, if you want.”

Virgil nodded, scrubbing his eyes and taking a deep breath.

Patton nodded and climbed to his feet. “Okay. I’ll be back as soon as I can, promise.”

He stepped out of the bathroom, shutting the door behind him and leaving Virgil alone with his thoughts again. He was still shaking, yes, but the terror of thinking he was going to die was settling into the more manageable fear of learning a new routine…

And maybe, a little, the risk of starting to put his trust into someone.

But maybe there wasn’t much to fear in that one.

Virgil leaned forward and finally dropped the bloody toilet paper into the trash.

* * *

The front door slammed open; Logan and Roman both nearly jumped out of their skin from where they sat at the dining room table.

“Virgil, we got your little butt-diapers!”

There was the sound of a light swat, and then the snatching of a plastic bag.

“St _ah_ p, Remus, he’s already having a hard time with it!”

Snickering echoed through the entryway as the two climbed the half-flight of stairs leading to the main floor. As Remus made a beeline to tackle Roman out of his chair, Logan adjusted his posture to be more formal and nodded at Mrs. Drake.

“Good afternoon, Alya,” he called.

“Hi, boys,” she quickly responded. “Are they still in the bathroom?”

“I believe so, yes.”

Mrs. Drake nodded and hurried off just as Roman wrestled Remus off of him. He glanced at the hallway, and then between his twin and his father.

“Wait, what’s going on?”

“Your baby bro’s anus is bleeding for the first time!”

“ _No,_ Remus,” Logan scolded. He turned to Roman. “He’s experiencing his first menstrual period. Your father called Mrs. Drake to help teach him the technical aspects of how to best handle it.”

Roman blinked and sat up straight. “Oh! Is he going to be alright?”

“Yeah, Mom brought a bunch of stuff to help,” Remus replied, waving his hand as he plopped into the open seat next to Roman. “Pads, painkillers, heating rice bag sock things, the whole shebang. And a bunch of chocolate and candy and stuff!”

“Ah, good. I’ve seen studies that dark chocolate helps with cramps,” Logan stated.

Remus sighed. “A shame. I was hoping we’d get to see Virgie’s tiny baby rip out of his stomach. Like that scene in _Aliens_!”

Roman let out a whine and swatted him. “Dude, that’s my little brother!”

“Oh, come on! Your other dad’s a nurse! He could stitch him back up in no time!”

“That is _not_ how nurses work!”

Logan hummed and adjusted his glasses, turning back to the papers he was grading. “Astounding. In less than two minutes, you’ve expressed your ignorance in both anatomy _and_ the careers of the medical field. I suggest you brush up on them both if you truly wish to study in the field of dentistry.”

“Haa, _brush up_ ,” Roman laughed.

Logan shot him a glare over the rim of his glasses; Roman and Remus high-fived.

“Do your homework, Roman.”

Roman grinned and turned back to face his homework, but his mind instead floated back to Virgil’s condition. He bit down on his lip and shifted before looking up and tapping his pencil end against the table.

“Seriously… Virgil _is_ going to be okay, right?” he asked.

Logan let out a soft breath. “Your brother is going to be just fine,” he gently reassured. “This is a natural thing for many people who possess uteri. He might be in pain for a little while, but ultimately, he will be alright.”

“My mom deals with it every month, and she’s not dead yet,” Remus pointed out. Then, with his grin fading a bit, he added, “ _Our_ mom probably had them, too. She must’ve, if she had us.”

Roman watched him for a long moment, and then he nodded, swallowing the lump that had snuck into his throat.

“Okay,” he whispered. “Okay.”

**Author's Note:**

> Hey, folks-- So, as it turned out, I made a bit of a mistake in explaining this. So sorry about this! Thank you so much to @romanslunchbox on Tumblr for pointing this out and correcting me:
> 
> “ It isn’t a huge mistake. However, in your fic you stated that the egg gets stuck in the lining of the uterus. But that is only possible with a fertilized egg. An non-fertilized egg dies in the oviducts before it can even reach the uterus. After the egg dies certain hormones are released to start the menstruation about 2 weeks later (how that works is an entire shit show of hormones and stuff). It takes a while for these hormones to be released, so the uterus keeps producing more lining for the egg to get stuck in. When the uterus finally gets the signale that there is no pregnancy, that is when the menstruation starts. “


End file.
